FAMILIARITY breeds contempt. Marc Ford, the former lead guitarist with the Black Crowes, has released 12 tracks of ‘Americana’ in Holy Ghost – but you could put any one of these dozen on perpetual rerun and the experience would remain the same.
Soft vocal delivery, some gentle acoustic guitar and the occasional solo are the rinse and repeat formula for Ford and it becomes repetitive extremely quickly. The one exception to the rule, the opening track If I’d Waited, is a nonentity – lasting barely a minute – and it feels like it is a facade, not helped by the fact this snapshot of the US mid-west was actually recorded in Monmouth, Wales, and in Bath.
Admittedly, those who flock to this kind of easy listening, Eagles-style soft rock will find much to admire in Ford. But variety is the spice of life, as the cliché goes, and there’s precious little of that in Holy Ghost.
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